Explanation

A phrase headed by an adjective. Examples (with the Head underlined) are messy, very enthusiastic, quite fond of dogs. Note that the National Curriculum stipulates that phrases should have at least two words, though it concedes in the entry for noun phrases that "Some grammarians recognise one-word phrases."

Identify the type of phrase (noun phrase, preposition phrase, etc.) in each of the examples. Although we have included verb phrases as an option, remember that the National Curriculum calls these clauses.